Play/Pause and stop media keys not working

Question

Hi everyone,

So I've got a weird problem, and I haven't found anyone else with the same issue.

For some reason the play/pause and stop media keys on my keyboard (K55) aren't working. If I test it on keyboardchecker.com it says MediaPlayPause and MediaStop, so the keys itself do work. I've tried it with both Spotify and VLC, and it they not do anything. Other keys like previous track, next track and volume controls work fine. It's just the play/pause and stop keys that don't work. Nothing happens.

Anybody got any clue as to what's going wrong here?

Answer 1

Hi Martijn, I am Paulo and I'd like to help.

If you have a browser open, maybe it is hijacking the media keys that's why it doesn't work on Spotify and VLC. Try to close them and see if it works.

If not, try to set it to disable on your browsers and see if it would make a difference.

Enter this if you have Chrome:

chrome://flags/#hardware-media-key-handling

If you have Edge:

edge://flags/#hardware-media-key-handling

If still not working, try the following

Close all apps before performing the below steps.

• Press the Windows key + R, type Services.msc and hit Enter.
• Then, locate for Human Interface Device Service from the list and look for the status of this service whether the service is started or stopped.
• If the service is stopped, then click on the Human Interface Device Service and click on Start.
• If the service is already started, then click on Restart to restart the service.
• Relaunch the Spotify/VLC and see if the media key would work

Answer 2

I've already disabled the media keys control for Chrome through flags a long time ago because I found it pretty annoying. Still, I tried fully exiting Chrome, and it's still not working. I checked task manager, and none of the browsers I have installed were running.

I tried restarting the HID service, but that didn't do anything either.

Remember, the previous and next track keys work fine. It's only the play/pause and stop keys that don't work.

Answer 3

Hi Martijn,

How about when using the browser, does it work when playing/pausing on a youtube video for example? Have you tried enabling the media keys there and check if it'll work on online videos or Spotify for web?

Answer 4

Just tried it, and the same thing happens as with other media players. Play/pause and stop keys don't do anything, previous and next track keys do work.

Answer 5

Hi Martijn,

Do you have extensions on your browser that you suspect could hijack the media keys even when the browsers are closed, specifically Google play music or other media player extensions? Please try disabling them if you have and see if that works

Another thing, try setting a default media player and see if that fixes the problem. Go to Settings > Apps > Default apps > Music then choose a player. Do the same with Videos and try setting VLC as default and see if that would work.

If still not working, since you mentioned that you have an external keyboard, try plugging it into another port and see if it's just a simple connection problem.

For Spotify, try toggling on/off the option "Show desktop overlay using media keys" in (...) > Edit > Preferences > Display